Sciongate
by Thrythlind
Summary: In an alternate timeline, SG-1 finds itself dealing with something other than just the Goa'uld... not sure if I'll continue this...lots of exposition in this first chapter


The scene was one of great pageantry as a small woman with a maniacal expression on her face rode on a palanquin through the streets of a beautifully crafted city, carried by strong men and flanked by grim warriors with long staves capable of producing a jolt of deadly energy.

"It looks like something out of an Akira Kurosawa film," one man muttered from the back of a crowd after first making sure that there was no one nearby to hear the comment.

"It should," another beside him said in an equally hushed whisper. "That's Inari down there, servant to the system lord Amaterasu."

"Uh huh," the first said. "And what does that mean?"

"It means they came to power by impersonating the gods and goddesses of Ancient Japan, Jack," the second responded. "So the whole samurai deal."

"Indeed," a third noted. "The warriors of Amaterasu are well known for considering death lightly. Even amongst the jaffa."

"And the information we have says that Inari is making a play for power," a woman noted.

"Which is why we're here," Jack noted. "Watching a parade."

"I believe, Jack O'Neill, that things are about to get more interesting," the third noted as he pointed below them.

"What the hell?" Jack said as a small group stepped out in front of the palanquin.

There were five of them, three women and two men and all of them were very distinctive.

At the head was a woman of mixed Japanese and African descent, carrying herself with a posture that screamed marine to the two air-force officers watching the proceeding. Her long blonde hair and golden trench coat contrasted the dark clothes and skin in an eye-catching manner. The grim look on her face showed that she was here with a purpose.

Near her a woman stood with a windbreaker and a lumpy hood concealing her head. There was something odd about the way the cloth sat about her head and the shadows fell on her face. Something disquieting and not quite natural. What little image they had of her skin was of a reddish tone as if suffering a bad sunburn. A silver whistle hung down from a chain around her neck that also seemed to draw eyes towards it.

On the right of the hooded woman was a tall man of Arabic descent leaning a long, wooden staff. He dressed like a modern nomad in the Arabian desert for the most part. He was slender and seemed not to have eaten properly for most of his life, but yet, there was no expression of fear on his face as he faced the jaffa and the Goa'uld they served.

On the other side, next to the dark and gold woman, a friendly seeming man stood dressed in the sort of suit one would most likely see in a nightclub on Earth rather than in front of a crowd of Goa'uld worshippers. He bore a bored smile on his face that was already aggravating the jaffa.

"What is the meaning of this," Inari demanded in the full voice of an angered Goa'uld.

"Excuse me, please," the fifth member of the group said. "That is my responsibility to answer."

The fifth member of the small group was dressed in a black dress that would have been common dress, save for its color, in the courts of China ages long past. She had an ethereal quality that her dark skin, an oddity given her Chinese features, did not detract from and only enhanced. At her throat was a green-spider tattooed that seemed completely appropriate to her in someway.

The woman stepped forward and bowed politely.

"My name is Acacia Liuzhi, " she said in a polite, friendly manner. "I have convinced my companions to give me this chance to reach a peaceful solution to this problem between you and our parents."

The watchers from Earth listened to this in interest.

"And what is the problem between us you speak of?" the Goa'uld host declared in surprise as she stepped off the palanquin that was set down.

"I do apologize," Acacia said, bowing. "I am unaware of the history of your Yan Luo. I meant no offense. As to the problem. That is simple, it is one of identity."

"Make yourself plain," Inari said.

"Indeed," Acacia noted. "In light of recent events, the Gods have decided that it is not….appropriate that a whole species of mortals be taking their names."

"Excuse me what are you implying," Inari asked.

"Implying," Acacia noted. "Oh dear, I am not being clear enough."

"Acacia," the dark-Japanese woman said. "Step back, please, and you might want to make your call."

Acacia looked to the other woman and sighed.

"Yes," the woman noted before turning toward Inari. "I do suppose that this is accomplishing nothing."

She walked back behind the others, retrieving a jade cell phone as she did so.

"A cell phone?" Carter noted. "How could she be getting a signal?"

"This is intolerable," Inari shouted. "Who are you to interfere with the servant of Amaterasu, system lord."

The Japanese woman blurred forward in perfect form, passing through the rows of jaffa guards with a speed beyond human as she sliced a golden knife that seemed to have appeared from nowhere across the throat of Inari.

"Kiyone Harnen," she said simply as silence reigned. "Daughter of Amaterasu…goddess."

Turning to look at the crowd and frozen jaffa she gave a hard look and said one more sentence as behind her Acacia finished with her cell phone and flipped it closed with a cultured gesture.

Immediately afterward a ripping sound pushed through the air around the woman and the long leg of some demonic arachnid pushed itself out from the thread-thick tear in space.

"Hooahh!!" she shouted, and it seemed as though the sound sent a river of fear through everyone around her, sending the citizens scattering away from the fight and making the jaffa visibly shaken.

That seemed to be the key and the other four were moving.

The hooded woman raised her whistle to her mouth and blew. No sound came out, but the ground beneath erupted upward as hideously formed things that might have been dogs clawed their way out of the ground.

A blast from a staff weapon rocketed across the scene towards Acacia, but the hooded woman stepped in the way, taking the blast and shrugging it aside with a hesitant gasp of pain. Still, the blast tore back her hood, revealing a face that would have been beautiful, even with the twisting asymmetrical horns growing out of the forehead, were it not for how every shadow on her face seemed to fall wrong.

She pointed to the jaffa that had fired the weapon at Acacia and spoke in a long dead European tongue. Immediately afterwards, the hellish hounds surged forward to mob the unfortunate man, tearing him to pieces with freezing breath and terrible claws.

Meanwhile, the bored looking man jumped forward, dodging through the jaffa on his way to join Kiyone, who was already wielding a pistol to join her knife. Likewise, the horned woman was wielding a pistol that seemed to spark more fire than normal as she moved to join the other two.

The Arabic man stood back, standing guard between the battle and Acacia as the woman's demon spider waded forward to join the battle as well. But he was not idle as he stood back and every time he brought his staff down onto the ground another Jaffa launched into the sky only to land later, hard on his back.

Very quickly the strong bodyguard was decimated and only the strangers were left standing.

Kiyone walked to the center of the battle and reached down to snatch up a snake-like creature with an expression of disgust.

"Mother is very angry," she said before slicing it in half.

The sound of reinforcements came to the ears of everyone still at the site, the hidden watchers of SG-1 included for the moment.

The hounds growled and the spider chittered non-sensically.

"Wei Shi Zhi is prepared to guard the way," Acacia noted as she moved forward to see to Inari's host.

"Of course he is," the bored looking man said. "He's already dead, when they beat him he just goes home."

"Death is natural to us all," Acacia noted. "Even Gods die when enough time passes."

"The hounds are also eager to stay," the hooded woman noted. "But let's hurry."

"One moment please," Acacia noted as she produced an old-fashioned black bag and worked swiftly upon the woman with the tools inside. "She should survive. Precision knife work Kiyone. Jason, if you please?"

"Always ready to help a beautiful woman," the man said as he lifted the injured former host gently.

"Saif," Kiyone noted. "Open the door."

"I am already doing so," the Arabic man said calmly.

As he did so, he tapped his staff upon the ground and the stone swirled away to reveal a stairwell leading down into nothing. Swiftly enough the five men and women walked through the doorway with Kiyone last, turning to spare the SG-1 team a look and a crisp salute before following.

As the stairwell vanished into nothing, the SG-1 team looked toward each other in shock and confusion. And then they faded away, heading for the stargate before the coming reinforcements.

****

Somewhere in Las Vegas, five people carried a sixth out of a hole in the ground that had simply appeared from nowhere.

"Well," Acacia noted. "Let us hope that not all of our operations shall be so exhausting. But we have made the impression desired."

"It is unlikely that we shall be able to make the journey again," Saif noted. "My father's gift of travel has but three more uses and once those are gone, we are limited to our own means and we shall not have the strength to travel so far until many stories have been told."

"I think we can expect to have visitors soon," Kiyone noted. "The omen was correct, there were Earth born humans, military, watching that fight. The gods are not the only ones concerned with these imposters."

The horned woman lifted her hood back over her face and grunted.

"Now," Jason said. "The question is whether or not we can tell the difference between the Majestic Twelve and the people we want to see."

"Maybe your sister can lend us some reinforcements," Acacia suggested.

"Medusa has her own war to wage," Jason said, shaking his head. "And she'll need every soldier she can get to handle to gorgons' minions."

****

"What happened?" General Hammond asked as SG-1 came back in early and in a hurry.

"Inari's power play is no longer a concern," Teal'c said coolly.

"We've got some people we'll need to identify," Jack said.

Carter retrieved a digital disk from her pack and held it up.

"We've got one of the weirdest things you are ever going to see," Carter said.

"Well," Hammond asked. "What is it?"

"If you believe the people involved," Daniel said. "The children of the true gods."

****

"Kiyone Harnen," a smiling man in non-descript civilian clothing said as he approached the woman. "I've seen all your movies, would you mind if I get an autograph?"

"All my movies," Kiyone said, sitting up. "You talk like I've been in movies for more than three years. Not many Americans have even heard of some of my movies."

"I'm a martial arts movie buff," the man said as he watched her sign the paper. "And the Asian cinemas have been getting much higher quality."

"I'm guessing you were stationed over there for a bit," Kiyone said standing up.

"Excuse me?" the man asked.

"Please, a soldier knows a soldier," Kiyone noted. "So is there anything else?"

"Actually," the man said. "We'd like to speak to you on a matter of national security."

"Ahh," Kiyone noted. "I think I might know what this is about."

"We thought you might," the man said.

****

"Is Dr. Acacia Liuzhi in," a woman in a formal, but not threatening outfit, suggested.

"Might I ask who is calling?" the secretary, a pretty Chinese woman, asked.

"The US air force," the woman said.

"Ah, yes," the secretary said. "I believe you're scheduled for…about thirty minutes from now."

"Excuse me?" the woman said in surprise.

"We had some information that you would be coming," the secretary explained. "But we thought it might be later in the day. Dr. Liuzhi is handling a patient right now, but she should be finished in…half-an-hour."

"I see," the woman said, non-pulsed as she moved back to sit down and wait.

In thirty minutes, as promised, the smiling face of Acacia Liuzhi walked escorted a young-seeming woman of Japanese descent with a recently bandaged throat.

"Now, I hope to be available to you whenever you might need me, but in case I am called away, I shall give you the name of an excellent counselor," Acacia was saying as she walked the young woman out the door. "And do please try to have a good day."

The young doctor, dressed in an elegant, black suit that was both proper and inticing at once. She turned her beautiful face toward the woman sitting in her waiting room.

"Greetings," Acacia said. "Shall we go?"

****

"Jason Aphaea," a humorless man said, standing over the unconcerned and relaxing young man sitting at the edge of the pool.

Jason smirked as he looked up toward the man and smiled.

"Wow, I get a sour one," Jason noted.

"Excuse me," the man said frowning.

Jason stood up and stretched.

"Must be mother getting back at me for being so…well, me," the man said smiling.

"This is serious, Mr. Aphaea," the business suited man noted. "A matter of…"

"National security, yes," Jason said. "If only that was all it was. Then I could tell Mom go stuff it and just…be. Still, have to be going I suppose."

****

Saif sat in the desert meditating as he heard the car pull up.

He listened carefully as the footsteps approached him, noting their number and ascertaining that this was the event he had been told to expect.

"Saif Ptah," a man said with a flawless Arabic accent and a polite tone. "We'd like you to come with use please."

"I have been told to expect you, gentlemen," he said, smiling as he stood up off of the heated sands. "Let us go."

****

The man sent to pick up Delilah Samson never even got to open his mouth before the grim and moody woman thrust a pile of papers into his hands and walked outside to wait by the government car.

In the private eye's office, the US government officer scanned through the papers in confusion as he read:

"'Kiyone Harnen,' a smiling man in non-descript civilian clothing said as he approached…."

****

"What do we have?" Jack asked he came into the observation room and looked down at the people within the room, all of whom were chatting in a casual manner.

"This is probably the damnedest collection of people I've ever seen," Hammond said. "Captain."

"Yes sir," Carter responded starting to read the files. "Kiyone Harnen was a Marine Martial Arts Instructor until she was involved in a bit of a public embarrassment and found her career dead-ended."

"What sort of embarrassment?" Daniel asked.

"Apparently," Carter said with a flush. "She got a little…lot…out of hand at a strip club. Very much out of character with the rest of her record. Since then she's done stunt work and then lead rolls for a Japanese film company. Has something of a growing fan following in East Asia. She's been living in Las Vegas for the past three months trying to push the American opening of some of her movies."

"The woman with the horns is Delilah Samson," Carter noted.

"Delilah…Samson," Daniel said in semi-disbelief at the name.

"Is that not the names of a woman from your Bible and the man she betrayed?" Teal'c asked.

"It's somewhat appropriate," Carter said. "She's an ex-cop, was accused of murdering her former partner and running some dirty side operations. She got out of trial when the man she was supposed to have killed walked into court on camera and accused someone else before falling down dead again. Still ended up drummed out of the department and runs a private investigation office in Las Vegas."

"And the horns?" Jack asked.

"The horns seem to be a symptom of Multiple Hereditary Exostoses," Carter said. "It's an inherited disorder makes bones grow unpredictably until puberty. It usually happens at joints, but not always as you can see. They've never been removed for a combination of money and fear that it would destabilize her skull too much."

"And who's the lazy guy there?" Jack asked, pointing to where Jason was leaning back against a wall and snoozing.

"Jason Aphaea," Carter noted. "He's a professor at the University in Las Vegas, teaches ethics and mythology. Three classes out of the week, spends the rest of his time being…well, independently wealthy. No military background, but has titles in Greco-roman wrestling and boxing both and takes part in the effort to rebuild pankration."

"And Pankration is?" Jack asked.

"The Greek martial art," Daniel noted. "Supposedly practiced by Alexander and the complete version of todays wrestling and boxing forms."

"Oh," Jack said. "So he's some sort of Greek kung fu guy, got it."

"That brings us to Saif Ptah," Carter noted.

"Ptah?" Teal'c said, arching an eyebrow. "That is the name of one of the earliest system lords, reportedly overthrown by Ra in the down of the Goa'uld empire."

"Yes, the Egyptian creator diety," Daniel agreed. "For that matter Aphaea is another name for Athena."

"In any case," Carter said. "Saif is a poet and professor at the same university. He teaches comparative religions and metaphysics. He works on the same staff as Aphaea, in fact."

"Convenient," Jack noted.

"The last is Dr. Acacia Liuzhi," Carter said. "She is a psychologist and medical doctor that specializes in grief counseling, warrior's and survivor's guilt. Pretty much anything that deals with surviving or causing death, in fact. She also has a reputation among as a paranormalist and in some stories a Buddhist exorcist. Her mother was also a paranormalist."

"So what are we dealing with here," Hammond asked.

"Let's go in and ask," Jack said. "Daniel, Teal'c, shall we?"

"Indeed," Teal'c said, moving to follow Jack out of the room.

Daniel was only a little bit behind them.

"Carter," Hammond said. "Can you start to analyze these 'magic items' of theirs?"

"I'll try, sir," Carter said.

And then Hammond turned to look into the room to see how things progressed.

"So…what's up?" he asked.

"Might I try to explain," Acacia asked.

"Well, I hope you do a better job than you did with the Goa'uld," Jack noted.

"Yes," Acacia said. "Well, I do believe that was intentional. We were seeking to make a point."

"You made it," Jack said. "Demons, monsters, superpowers. Very impressive."

"But quite impractical in the long run," Acacia noted. "We are not very powerful yet, but we needed to…attract attention."

"You have it," Jack said, sitting down across from them. "What are you?"

"We're the children of the gods," Acacia said. "I am the daughter of Yan Luo. Kiyone is the daughter of Amaterasu. Jason is the son of Athena, adopted of course. Saif is the son of…"

"Ptah, I started to figure that out from his name," Daniel noted. "And what about Delilah Samson over there."

The self-proclaimed god-children shuffled hesitantly as they looked, semi-helplessly toward the woman in question.

"My father's Loki," she said.

"Where were sent here to help you," Acacia said.

"We are already dealing with one cadre of false gods," Teal'c said. "Why should we seek to up-raise another set."

"Ah, here is where we have our miscommunication," Acacia noted.

"What do you mean," Daniel asked.

"It's a matter of how you define a God," Jason said. "If you mean the sort of infaliable all-powerful deity that these imposters seek to be, then know. But if you mean a being of great power that embodies certain aspects of the natural world or human endeavor, then that's where our parents come into it."

"And your parents will make no demands on us?" Teal'c asked.

"Depends on the God," Kiyone said. "They know they depend on us, but we depend on them as well."

"You see," Saif said. "Long ago, before time as we recognize it, there were only the Titans, and these were the living embodiments of raw, inhuman forces such as cold, time, darkness, light, water and so forth. The World existed in chaos and merely obeyed the whim of the Titans."

"Yes," Daniel said. "And then the Gods rebelled and created man, this is pretty much the same story throughout."

"Actually," Saif said. "You have things a little backwards. First, a new form of life appeared and the Titans ignored them as insignificant. Slowly, this new form of life grew more numerous and more numerous and the impact of their dreams started shaping some of the Titans into something new."

"You're saying that humans made the Gods," Daniel said.

"Not just humans," Saif said. "Mortals. By our dreams and our desires and our hopes. Thus did the alien Titans become the more humanistic Gods."

"Of course, the Titans did not approve of their spawn growing independent and tried to destroy the Gods," Saif continued. "but they were put down and imprisoned and the Gods were left to meddle in the affairs of men for ages.

"Eventually, as their dabblings in the World brought the Gods themselves into conflict, the agreement was made to leave mortals largely to their own affairs. Since then, the Gods have limited themselves to fading into the background, siring children occasionally, encouraging stories to be told of their pasts, but not commanding mortality."

"We've been tasked with making the imposters know they have not been appreciated," Kiyone said.

"And if the Gods have been around all this time?" Jack said. "Why do they suddenly care about the Goa'uld now?"

"Because," Acacia said. "Now, the Titans have begun to escape."

"Why were they not killed to begin with," Teal'c asked.

"Titans are inhuman, alien and uncomprehending of human virtue," Acacia said. "They only know anger, wrath and the urge to devour and breed. However, they are still the embodiment of raw natural forces. They cannot be killed without consequence. Only one has, and the result was a cataclysm of terrible proportions that ended the lives of many billions of mortals and wreaked havoc in the heavens."

"The Titans have to be contained," Saif noted. "Controlled. Or they will reduce everything to chaos. But they cannot be killed for fear of the same thing."

"In other words," Daniel said, getting the idea. "If we managed to kill the Titan of…say, Darkness. Then all darkness would end."

"That doesn't sound so bad," Jack said.

"Everything on Earth and other planets would die from exposure to the heat of their suns," Daniel explained.

"Okay, that's bad," Jack noted.

"You said that stories shaped the Gods," Daniel said. "Is that why you're concerned with the Goa'uld."

"Yes," Acacia said. "If it were not for the rising of the Titans, it would be of minor concern. A story is a story and would still do nothing but spread word of the deity in question. But with the Titans arising, stories of the fall of the Gods cannot be accepted."

"So how do we know you're not trying to help the Goa'uld," Teal'c asked. "Keeping them in power would prevent their fall and these stories you wish to avoid."

"There are many Gods," Acacia noted. "With many varying degrees of morality. And some have wanted for many thousand years to strike at the Goa'uld and were only prevented by the agreement that has stood in place to recently. As for the immoral…well, not many of them appreciate being impersonated."

"Fate ties Men and Gods together," Delilah spoke up. "What happens to one happens to both. They can't escape each other, especially not those of us who are born of both. Even in the time they agreed to stay out of active affairs, the Gods were drawn to us. As a group, mortals are very powerful."

"Indeed," Jason said. "My mother and many younger Gods, some of whom were mortals to begin with, largely view the situation with mankind as one of partnership."

"Your basic claim is," Jack said, summarizing. "Is that you're hear to make it clear that the Goa'uld are not the gods and that the true gods are ticked at them."

"While handling the odd titanspawn that tries destabilize things," Jason noted.

"And you need to do this so Cthulhu doesn't eat us all," Jack finished, ignoring the scion.

"Well, not just Cthulhu," Acacia noted, embarrassed.


End file.
